Florida homebuilders are getting in on the property tax media circus.
The state Homebuilders Association plans to stage a march from the Tallahassee-Leon County Civic Center to the Capitol at 11 a.m. Tuesday. This comes a week after a GOP-funded group called Floridians for Property Tax Reform bused in over 300 people to hold a rally on the Old Capital steps.
"The future of Florida's housing industry rests with meaningful property tax reform," their statement reads. "Florida's construction industry -- the state's second largest economic engine producing more than $65 billion annually -- is in jeopardy of being taxed out of existence. When this happens, the American dream of home ownership will disappear for thousands of Floridians."
Like the Tax Reform rally, House Speaker Marco Rubio plans to speak to the "hundreds" of home builders, contractors and trade workers expected.
What they want is some guarantee that reform won't trigger a massive arms race of sorts with the impact fees that cities and counties charge builders.
Earlier this week, homebuilder lobbyist Doug Buck tried to get the Senate property tax bill amended to bar local governments from raising such fees as a result of caps the Legislature plans to put on their property tax revenue.
Sen Jeff Atwater, a North Palm Beach Republican and heir to the Senate presidency, offered the amendment in committee Tuesday to limit cities and counties from increasing impact fees faster than the rate of inflation.
But the homebuilder-pushed amendment drew a rapid rebuke from county government officials who said doing so would prohibit them from meeting growth demands for roads, schools and water supplies.
Home builders know local governments are going to try to make up their losses with higher impact fees – and one even admitted as much at the hearing.
Wakulla County Commissioner Ed Brimner said his commission met late Monday night and voted at 10:30 p.m. to impose a $6,000 school impact fee over the next three years as a result of the talk of a state-mandated property tax cut.
After pressure from co-workers on the panel, Atwater later withdrew the amendment but pledged to bring it up later.

After two days and eight-plus hours of debate, the House's 78-40 vote for a property tax joint resolution Wednesday wasn't a clean party line split.
Two fairly prominent Republicans – Reps. Gayle Harrell of Stuart and Andy Gardiner of Orlando – voted against it. Harrell is planning to run for Congress against U.S. Rep. Tim Mahoney next year and said yesterday she couldn't support the sales tax hike in the plan. Harrell later praised a separate tax rollback plan on the House floor that doesn't include the sales tax. Gardiner was the majority leader under House Speaker Allan Bense.
But the slight peeling of support was negated by three Democrats casting votes against their caucus – Reps. Ed Bullard of Miami, Luis Garcia of Miami Beach, and Michael Scionti of Tampa.
House leaders have acted like the vote outcome was never in real doubt.
But Rep. Stan Mayfield, a Vero Beach Republican diagnosed with throat cancer last month, did make the trip back to Tallahassee to vote for the bill.

Senate President Ken Pruitt is calling next week "turf war week" in the Legislature, for good cause.
The chamber plans to consider a raft of special-interest driven proposals that could help pad the wallets of phone companies, insurance companies and casinos.
"You name it, it's out there," says the Port St. Lucie Republican.
Pruitt has been less-than-enthusiastic about most of these bills, and points out that his chamber has spent its first seven weeks passing a lot of public policy from new teacher bonuses and environmental protections to crime-and-punishment fare.
But now, the corporations that pony up the tens of millions of dollars every campaign season to help lawmakers stay in office will get their day. In fact, they get a week.
Pruitt says it's a decision he's made out of deference to individual senators and the new leadership structure in the Senate that spreads power among more members.
"These are senators who have filed bills that they feel worthy of being considered," Pruitt said. "It is my thought process that let's go ahead and put it out on the floor in one week."
So, next week could be the bellwether for whether "flattening the pyramid" has in fact strengthened the hands of special interests of diluted their power.

What started as a poorly executed joke by state Rep. Don Brown is threatening to become a larger fight over the extent of state dollars supporting illegal immigrants in Florida.Brown, R-DeFuniak Springs, was roundly criticized by colleagues last week for forwarding a joke about immigrants to House members and staff that read, "Don't forget to pay your taxes ... 12 million illegal aliens are depending on you!" He later apologized for sending it.But on Monday, he called for a state investigation into the number of illegal immigrants in Florida, and what their economic costs may be via state healthcare, housing, school, college scholarship and prison services they receive.
At a hastily arranged press conference, Brown said his apology had been misunderstood."I am sorry I offended my colleagues, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with the e-mail," he said, adding the term "alien" that offended Hispanic lawmakers was prefaced by "illegal, illegal, illegal."
Brown said he had received about 200 e-mails since the story broke late last week, six of them insulting toward him. A vast majority, he estimated, had been sent from Floridians and urged him to take the issue seriously.
"This was not an issue that was top on my radar screen, but it is now," he said.
In an earlier statement, Brown added "state government has a budget crisis and the Legislature is talking taxes – cuts, shifts and increases," while trying to fund education, law enforcement, health care and prison construction."With this in mind, I am calling for a state investigation . . . regarding the possible abuse of our tax dollars in funding illegal aliens."Brown says he's also proposing a joint resolution calling on President Bush and Congress to craft a nationwide "deportation" program and complete construction of a fence on the U.S.-Mexican border.But he conceded it's probably too late to file a resolution this late in the session, and he may have to wait until next year.